


Ekplírosi

by orphan_account



Series: How to Fall In Love With A Human [16]
Category: Supergirl (TV 2015), Wonder Woman - All Media Types
Genre: F/F, Gen, Themiscyra
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-24
Updated: 2016-01-24
Packaged: 2018-05-16 00:30:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5806261
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kara's trip to Wonder Woman's home island of Themiscyra, and the revelations that come along with it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ekplírosi

When Kara came to, she was lying on a large, comfortable bed in a white marble room with wide open windows that allowed a warm breeze to flow through.  Outside, she could make out a turquoise sky wisped with clouds, and the tops of some lush trees.  She sat up and looked around.  The air smelled green and sweet and hinted with the perfumes of flowers she couldn’t begin to name.  She rubbed her eyes, for a moment trying to put her brain back together.  The medallion… Themiscyra …. right.  She was here, in Diana’s home.  She had no idea what she hoped to learn, but if nothing else, she figured, it would be one more away weekend.

A tall, muscled brunette entered softly through the high, arched doorway at the other side of the room, wearing what looked like Greek casual attire of the sort that would have been all the rage about two or three thousand years ago.  “Oh,” she remarked cheerfully, “you’re already awake.  It takes most humans a few hours to recover from the materializing process.”

Kara smiled.  “I’m not human.”

The brunette smiled back.  “Well, that explains it.”  She moved quickly across the room and took Kara’s hand.  “My name is Artemis.”

Kara shook her hand. She had that same ease and warmth that Diana did, not to mention that same Amazonian grip.  “Pleasure to meet you.  I’m Kara.”

“Diana had said you might be coming to us for a visit.”

Kara nodded hesitantly.  “What… what did she tell you, exactly?  About me?”

Artemis leaned on the carved headboard of the bed.  “Not much.  Only that you were a friend, born of a world called Krypton, and thought you might enjoy it here.”

Kara peered out the window again.  “Is this …?”

“This is the island of Themiscyra.”

“Is it on Earth?”

Artemis smiled.  “On Earth, but not of it, you might say.”

Kara smiled.   _Like me,_ she thought.

“So.  Are you feeling well?  Would you like a tour?”

Kara pushed back the light coverlet and saw that her street clothes had been replaced by a knee-length blue chiton not unlike Artemis’s.  

“I hope you don’t mind,” Artemis added, gesturing at the clothing.  “That garment is much better suited to the sorts of things you’ll be enjoying here.”

Kara shrugged, and followed Artemis out of the chamber into a wide, open-air corridor.  She noticed to her right the thick vegetation, the large, colorful birds with their massive golden beaks, the sounds of trickling water (a waterfall?) and then beyond that, the breathing of the sea.

“So…” Kara began, looking to make conversation, “are you Diana’s sister?”

“We are all sisters here,”  Artemis answered warmly, “for we are all daughters of Hippolyta.”

Kara scrambled with her Greek mythology.  Hippolyta… the Amazon queen who married… Hercules?  Theseus?  She hadn’t thought about it in forever and couldn’t get the story quite straight in her head.

“Diana has told me that you’re a warrior?” Artemis inquired, leading her down a winding marble staircase that swept down and outside the walls of the building, leading to ground level, where Kara was better able appreciate the height and beauty of the trees, and the colors that the light made when filtering through their leaves.  

Kara didn’t know how to answer that question.  “In a way,” she replied, feeling completely dissatisfied with that and knowing Artemis wouldn’t be satisfied either.

“What way?” she pursued.

Kara sighed heavily.  “I have fought and won some battles,” she admitted.

As they walked along the path landscaped with giant lilies in orange and blue, Kara could hear that they were drawing closer to the sounds of steel against steel, of grunting, of cheers and boisterous shouts.

“Then you are a warrior,” Artemis decided with a grin.  “You should spar with us.”

“I’m not sure it’s polite to fight my hosts,” Kara hedged.  She had no idea whether all these women were like Diana.

“It is impolite _not_ to,” Artemis rejoined.

They rounded the corner and emerged onto a courtyard, where a group of about twenty women dressed in stamped bronze cuirasses with white chitons underneath, watching two other similarly armored women set to each other armed with spears and shields.  She saw one get knocked into the dust and a round of cheering and japing followed as they congratulated the victor and teased the fallen with sly, friendly barbs.

Artemis shouldered her way through the group and raised her voice.  “Sisters!”  she called to them.  “I have with me Kara Zor-El, a guest of our Diana, and a warrior of Krypton!  Let us make her welcome!”

A cheer went up from the group and warm waves and smiles followed.  

A small blonde girl stepped out from the crowd with a sword at her belt and a shield strapped to her arm.  She was easily a full head shorter than Kara.  “May I be the first?”

Artemis smiled.  “Persephone.  Of course.”

Kara tapped Artemis’s shoulder.  “Um, the whole sword-shield-spear thingy … um… that’s kind of not my thing.  I … don’t really know how to do that.”

Artemis gave out a broad, expansive laugh.  “Then Persephone shall have to face you in hand to hand combat!”

Persephone tossed her weapons aside and strode to the center of the courtyard, readying herself.

“Um,” Kara whispered, “she’s awfully small….and, um, you know…. I’m not exactly–”

Artemis clapped a hand on her back.  “Do not allow her size to fool you!”  She pushed her gently forward.  “Go ahead!  And may the gods be with you both!”

Kara strode forward, and Persephone came running toward her;  the force of her blow sent them both tumbling, end over end, across the courtyard and smashing them into a thick marble wall.  The force of their landing left a spiderweb of cracks in its face.  “Damnit,” Kara muttered.  She hadn’t been expecting that.  But at least she knew this Persephone was made of sterner stuff than she appeared, and she no longer needed to hold back.

Persephone lacked flight abilities but she did not lack speed, and it was clear that, however old she actually was, she’d spent her entire life doing combat training.  Her grip was every bit as strong as Kara’s and when they’d get hold of one another in the center of the ring, with the other Amazons around them, cheering heartily, they’d scuffle back and forth, raising clouds of dust.  And when one of them would disengage and quickly skirt around for a blow from one side or the other, the resulting impact sent them hurtling several feet.  It went on for several minutes, and Kara considered using her heat vision or freeze breath, but felt it would be unfair; she had no wish to hurt her opponent.  It was just a friendly show of skills, and in the end, Persephone’s were, Kara had to admit, somewhat superior.

But it occurred to her, as she picked herself up from the dust, with three or four cheerful Amazon women teasing her lightly as they helped her up, that this was the first time she’d been in an environment where she wasn’t a freak.  Where everyone else was strong, powerful, warriors.  It gave her a pang in her chest, suddenly.  She had always wondered, what must it be like, to belong?  That moment was the first time she’d ever had an inkling.

 

****

 

Artemis showed her the lush forests of the island, Kara in flight, and Artemis on the back of some great, iridescent-feathered beast.  The swept through the hills, the trees, around the coast where the blue waters lapped at the sand with foamy kisses, and Kara tasted something that felt a lot like freedom.  No pretending.  No lying.  No glasses.  No secret identity.  She was Kara Zor-El here, and there was nobody to tell her she couldn’t be.

As the sun began its descent and the light turned orange, the women began putting out torches and lighting fires by the water’s edge.  It struck Kara that it was the most magnificent barbecue she’d ever seen, as she watched the Amazons, and then helped them, haul immense beasts out to the beach on gigantic spits to be roasted over the fires.  Kara had no idea what those animals were, and considered asking, but figured she was probably going to be eating Minotaur or something and thought better of it.  Casks of wine and great barrels of fruit descended the hills in the arms of various Amazons and as the sky edged from orange to pink to pale purple and the stars began to fade in, the celebration began in earnest.

Persephone was quick to bring her a cup of wine and heartily congratulate her on a match well-fought.  Kara was grateful and found herself later arm-wrestling with Persephone and then a few other women, over a barrel that had been emptied of its fruits.  The roasted meat was mouth watering and tender and falling off the bone, and the air and the laughter gave Kara a pleasant high. And as the night went from purple to black, with its spattering of stars, the energy slowly ramped down.

The flames from the fires were still strong, but not roaring as they had been a few hours ago.  The women clustered around the largest flame, seated in a ring around it, their bronzed faces basking in its flickering glow.  Kara found herself seated between Persephone and another woman, as Artemis began to speak.

“To honor our guest,” she said, looking around the circle, “we shall tell her the stories of our people, that she may better know us and that we may deepen the bonds of friendship.”

So Kara sat, and listened.  She listened to the tale of Hippolyta, who fell in love with, and then fought Ares, the God of War.  She listened to how Zeus spared Ares’s life, but Hera imprisoned him; how in return for the ways Ares had caused her to suffer, Hera gifted Hippolyta this island, where she and her Amazons could live forever in a peaceful paradise.  She told the story of Diana’s birth, how Hippolyta had formed her from the clay on the shores of the island and Hera imparted life to the form she had made.   How Diana was now an emissary to the outside world, taking on the cause of saving humanity from itself, and readying them for a world that would include gods, and monsters, and Amazons.

And it struck Kara:  Diana had _chosen_ to live among humanity.  She had chosen it, knowing she would be extraordinary, and treated it as both a duty and a joy.  Kara understood now why she seemed so at ease with herself.  She was never anything less than a child of the gods, and had never been asked to be.

“And now,”  Persephone said gently, when the story was done, “you must tell us _your_ story.”

Kara sat stunned for a moment.  She hadn’t expected that.  She took a breath and began, thinking she’d do some sort of brief, perfunctory, “I’m from another planet” elevator speech.  But something happened when she began speaking; she couldn’t stop.  She told of her childhood on Krypton, the faraway world with so much to offer, so many advancements, that had still, tragically, been killing itself.  Her noble mother the judge, who had to lock her own sister away for violent protests against Krypton’s short-sighted self-annihilation.  She told of the day she was sent away in a pod, as the planet collapsed in flames behind her, taking all the art and architecture and songs and stories and gods and foods and families she knew with it.  She told of being sent to Earth to protect her cousin.  The years of isolation, hurtling through space, being knocked off course, arriving to find that with her entire world gone and her cousin now grown into the famous Superman, that her only purpose for living had been stolen from her.  

She told them how she had been taken in by the Danvers family, how they tried to help her adjust to the powers that Earth’s sun gave her, and then helped her to learn to hide them.  Encouraged her to fit in, to be ordinary, to be human.  She had lived a life of caution, of quiet grief, bereft of purpose, she told them, until it came down to saving her adopted sister’s life, and then she was forced to admit who she was, and show her powers to the world.  She told them how she had struggled to become the hero her cousin was, the hero she wanted to be; how despite all her heroics, she was torn between Kara Zor-El and Kara Danvers, between the life of a human with her human lover and the isolated life of an alien hero from a shattered world.  She told them of the loneliness of Paris, and missing her human life in America, and how she couldn’t keep herself from saving people and how all she wanted in this world, more than anything, was to feel whole.  All she wanted was to not be that frightened little girl in a pod, alone, hurtling through space with no idea whether she’d reach her destination.

“And now… well, now I’m here,” she finished, awkwardly, with a sad smile.  It was so strange, but she’d never told her whole story in one shot to anyone, not even Cat.  She felt wrung out, taking a moment to realize the enormity of it.

She looked around the circle and saw that a number of the eyes were not dry.  

“Sister Kara,”  Artemis said with glistening eyes, putting an arm around her shoulder, “you will always have a home here, among us, if you want it.”

 

***************

 

She swam in the sea and then took rest in the night, back in the room that she’d woken up in.  The morning greeted her with simple breakfast of yogurt and fruit and some more sparring in the courtyard.  Another Amazon, Clyemne, showed her some techniques for hand to hand combat, and when she sparred again with Persephone, she won.  She couldn’t wait, she thought gleefully, to try them out on Alex.

Artemis came to her later and pulled her aside.  “Queen Hippolyta would like to meet with you.”

Kara nodded and followed her up into the great house at the top of the hill, wondering what to expect from this meeting with a living myth.  

She’d been expecting to be led into a great hall, but instead this felt more like the Queen’s private suite, a sitting room with low, comfortable couches, large open windows that let the breezes in, tapestries in blue and white and silver, woven with the epic stories of the Amazons and their victories.  Kara knew Hippolyta as soon as she laid eyes on her, reclined comfortably on one of the couches; she had the same dark hair, the same bearing as Diana, somehow proud and confident and easy and relaxed all at once.  Her eyes, sharp and blue as sapphires, found Kara’s, and she beckoned her to sit.

“You have been welcomed by my daughters,” she began, without introduction.  “Which means, you are welcomed by me.”

Kara bowed her head quietly.  “Thank you.”

She could feel Hippolyta gazing at her, assessing and considering her.  “Artemis has told me of your strength and bravery, and of the story of the destruction of your home.  I am sorry for your losses, child.  I cannot fathom the extent of your grief.”

Kara remained quietly humble.  “Thank you,” she said again.

“How long will you be staying?”

Kara hesitated.  A part of her longed to stay among the Amazons and live this insulated life among strong, powerful women, in this lush paradise.  But she continued to feel the tug of home: her human friends and family, Cat, National City, Paris in the springtime, Julien and Manon, roast beef sandwiches, CNN, Game of Thrones.  Those things were every bit as much a part of her soul as the side of herself that was touched by being here.  “I… thank you for your hospitality, but I think I need to return to my life in Paris today.”

Hippolyta nodded, her eyes sympathetic.  “Then before you go, I wish to give you a gift.”  She stood, and beckoned Kara to follow her.  “Come.”

Kara followed her through the chamber to another room that overlooked the back face of a hillside with a waterfall, and beside it, at the foot of the hill, stood a modest little villa built of white clay and stone, with a small courtyard in the center.  Kara wondered why she was being shown this.

“I am naming you my ambassador to Krypton,”  Hippolyta told her.  “There, though it is small, is your embassy.”

Kara’s mouth dropped open.  “I… I don’t understand… there are no more than a handful of Kryptonians left...”

“And you are our ambassador to them,”  Hippolyta repeated.  “And as such, that building, your embassy, is Kryptonian land.”

Kara’s heart clenched for a moment.  

“Kara Zor-El,” Hippolyta said, turning to her and placing a hand on her shoulder, “you will always have a home here.”

  


*************

 

Kara was still processing everything that had happened to her.  Her visit had been short but she bade warm, fond goodbyes to the women of Themiscyra, in particular Artemis and Persephone.  Artemis pressed a medallion in to her hand, the same one she’d been given by Diana, and Kara took it gratefully.  She knew she would be returning.

"May you find your _ekplírosi_ ,"  Artemis told her warmly, "your fulfillment."

Kara had wondered how Diana could be so at peace with her powers.  She understood now that it was her powers that gave her that peace in the first place.  The truth of this was so large, Kara knew she'd be grappling with it for more than a minute.

She awoke on her own couch that night, still wearing the blue chiton, with her street clothes balled up underneath her head.  It occurred to her that, no matter what she was wearing, she was still, and would always be, Kara Zor-El.


End file.
